Butler Ag Students Awarded at National Conference

Butler Community College’s Agriculture department participated in the North American College and Teachers of Agriculture (NACTA) judging conference last month.

Butler joined with 31 students making up eight teams. Butler took second place in the overall sweepstakes award, which is presented to schools based upon team rankings across multiple contests.

Butler’s agriculture department competes in various judging, knowledge and skills contests. The NACTA is held at various locations in the United States each year, this one was hosted by Black Hawk College in Moline, IL, April 8 - 10.

Marcus Arnold, Butler associate professor of agriculture, and Joel Judge, lecturer of agriculture, took the students to the event.

“The kids did great and competed hard, both Marcus and I are very proud of all our contestants,” Judge said.

One of Butler’s participating students was Derek Larsen of Kechi, a student of the one-year certificate program. Larsen was named overall high individual by a large margin, for receiving the highest score in the contest.